


clear the table, my dear

by amiesce



Category: Jessica Jones (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Kilgrave is soft and ooc in this one, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Rare Pairings, Wanda is 24 and Kills is 37, past Wanda/Vision - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:15:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22912309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amiesce/pseuds/amiesce
Summary: ...we’ll tidy everything in the morning.Vignettes of the relationship between a telepathic witch and a sorta-Avenger with mind control (somewhat reformed). She’s slowly picking up the pieces. He’s trying to be better.
Relationships: Wanda Maximoff/Kilgrave
Comments: 1
Kudos: 8





	clear the table, my dear

**Author's Note:**

> Okay hear me out—  
> Kilgrave is way, way softer in this fic. I realize there’s a huge gap to be filled between canon events and this, and I’ve been slowly chipping away at a longfic to explore how that might happen. But for now, will you be okay with these soft slice-of-life vignettes of this absurd pairing I came up with? Yes?  
> There are non-explicit sexy times in vignette #3, to be skipped if you’re not into that.

**1\. Karmic balance**

“Kills, no,” Wanda muttered under her breath.

“The waitress was a bitch,” Kilgrave griped, shoving his chair away from the table and tossing his napkin down. “And they got your order wrong.”

Trust him to make a scene—the man was made for the theater. She’d been irritated at the poor service tonight, of course. But any pettiness she felt always paled in comparison to the depths of misanthropy that Kilgrave was capable of. At least he’d grown out of telling servers to strangle themselves with their apron strings.

Kilgrave had been more of his usual ticking-time-bomb self this evening, and she’d played the role of the bomb squad enough times to know how to handle him. Though that didn’t make it any less annoying. Wanda sighed and reached across the table for the check.

Wanda, as an off-duty, semi-retired Avenger, received a generous pension, paid out of the foundation that Stark had set up many years back in preparation for the inevitable. Even if Stark had championed the Accords, he wasn’t going to leave his team out to dry on the government’s dime.

Kilgrave worked for his money, for once, as an on-and-off consultant for the Avengers. Really, the job was a way to keep tabs on him. The pay was alright.

In short, Wanda didn’t mind picking up the bill. She wrote down a large tip for good measure, to restore the karmic balance and compensate for Kilgrave’s moral shortcomings. Kilgrave rolled his eyes as she grabbed her purse off the back of her chair and began fishing around in it.

“Alright, fine,” he snapped, walking around to her side of the table and slapping down his own card.

Wanda suppressed a snort. It shouldn’t be funny that 37 year-old man often behaved no better than a tantrum-prone 5 year-old. But in an inoffensive situation like this, without any lives on the line, it was a  _ little  _ funny.

She pulled out her wallet and smiled up at him. “We can go dutch.”

**2\. An offensive situation**

“You  _ don’t  _ tell me what to do,” she snarled. The door to their apartment shoved itself open at the brusque wave of her hands.

“Come on, sweetheart, that’s not fair,” he snapped. “It’s not something I can just shut off.”

“Call me sweetheart again, Kevin.”

“Oh, that’s nice.”

Red light crackled between her fingers as she whirled back toward him, stopping him in his tracks. Kilgrave wasn’t some knock-kneed pagan worshipping on her summit, but he was every bit aware that he was going to have a hard time talking himself out of this one.

“Maybe we should both calm down,” he said, lifting his hands placatingly and emphasizing the mutuality of the suggestion. Not an order—as much as he could manage.

Wanda’s palms twitched. “I’m calm.”

“I’d feel more convinced,” he continued, still speaking very carefully, “if you’d let up on the firework fingers.”

“Are you going to  _ make  _ me?”

He took a deep breath in. “I could. But I won’t.”

“Only because you know I won’t let you.”

“No, because I don’t want to.”

She laughed, the red light radiating out from her small frame like solar flares. “That’s exactly what you’ve always wanted. Power over me.”

“That’s not true and you—” He cut himself off, because there were so few syntactical avenues open to him if he went down that route. “I told you, Wanda. I don’t want this unless unless you want it to. Your choice. Always has been.”

Wanda’s hands returned to their normal state, but the storm didn’t leave her eyes.

“You actually believe yourself when you say that,” she stated.

He grit his teeth. “So it’s okay for you to use your powers on me, but when I do it’s the end of the world.”

Wanda scoffed. “You’re not in any position to lecture me.”

“I’m not lecturing, I’m just confused. Just where do you draw the line, Wanda?”

“Right here,” she said. “I’m done.” She strode away in the direction of their bedroom, muttering in Sokovian under her breath.

Kilgrave wasn’t going to bother with chasing her down. Let her blow off steam. He slammed the front door shut and threw himself down on the couch in front of the tv.

In the other room, he heard the muffled thud of something being thrown against the wall.

**3\. Shut off**

Sex was tricky to navigate with mind control and telepathy in the equation. It meant you had to be careful if you were telling your partner to choke on your dick. Or you needed to decide when to pipe up regarding your partner’s insecurity about the size and prowess of said dick.

It wasn’t like you could just shut it off.

One time Wanda blasted him through their bedroom wall into the living room because he had thoughtlessly ordered her to “take it like a bitch”. It wasn’t the profanity that bothered her at all, but the fact that her control had been stripped away from her like an afterthought. His apology was genuine. She eventually got around to fixing the wall.

Once Kilgrave broke down and wept in the middle, because it was the anniversary of his mother’s death, and Wanda pushed him onto his back and rode him ungently and swallowed his sobs between her teeth. He was so emotion-raw and hurt afterward that she avoided him for days before finally sitting with him so that they could both talk it out.

Wanda liked being pinned down, Kilgrave’s thin hands pressing into her wrists, knowing that she could totally hurl him into the ceiling if she wanted to, but instead she met his eyes and watched the furrow of pleasure in his brow and listened to the wordless panting or occasional low growl that he made.

Kilgrave liked the way her body begged, how her hips rolled into him needily and how the blood flushed her skin like wildfire, and when he stuttered to a close inside her she wrapped her legs around him to keep him there, and her eyes were fiercely possessive as he languidly melted on top of her.

He was a mess of anxiety and hunger for affection and the tentative realization that he could be happy for once, and he never tried to shield his thoughts (she doubted he ever could) but broadcasted everything like a desperately burning star scattering its light and heat into the void. She wanted to bask in him for a long time.

She massaged his scalp and kissed his eyelids and in the morning she got up to wash last night’s dishes wearing nothing but his shirt, and when he molded his chest to her back she complained and flicked soapsuds at his cheek, and when he retaliated by tugging her ear with his teeth, she smiled. He’d never asked her to do that.

**4\. Sing, kookaburra**

She was 15 when they colonized her body and mind with their scalpels and electrodes. They gave her a lolly or a caramel toffee after each session and herded her back to the starkly lit cell with the solid wall that separated her from her twin. When she discovered that she could rearrange atoms and that walls would never have to hold her again, they stopped giving her lollies and kept her in a straitjacket until she promised not to misbehave. Then they moved Pietro to a different part of the facility.

Tears glittered in Kilgrave’s eyes when she removed her hand from his temple. Since he made no move to wipe them away, Wanda could tell that he hadn’t realized he was crying.

“I wanted to show you,” she murmured, settling her hand against his bare chest (where his pulse raced like retreating deer) and lowering her head against the pillows. “You’re not the only one.”

She knew that wasn’t the thing he wanted to hear. He didn’t do well with empathy that drew attention to his sadness, his nestled hurts, the burrs of neglect that clung to every designer suit, expensive car, dinner reservation at five star restaurants. But it still needed saying.

Kilgrave shook her off and rolled onto his other side, his back toward her. “We’re nothing alike,” he muttered, sniffing sharply. “You and your brother signed up for that. I was  _ born  _ into the shit I had to deal with.”

“We were kids,” Wanda said, choosing gentleness over indignation. “We didn’t know what we were getting ourselves into. Our parents were dead and we thought that this would make things right. Hurt the people who hurt us.” She sat up and curled her fingers over his shoulder, in his hair. “We were children. Children don’t understand that adults sometimes make mistakes, push us beyond what we can handle. And we don’t have the words to tell them that it’s too much.”

He snorted, but he didn’t contest the fingernails that lightly scratched his scalp. “Speak for yourself. I had plenty to say.”

Wanda bent down to kiss his temple. The dawning light exposed his furtive gestures as he wiped his face. Outside their window, a pigeon loudly struck the glass with its wings and tail before settling on the sill. It crooned in its throat, a low and forgiving sound.


End file.
